In the Los Angeles Times, James Queally explores the stories of American-adopted children born to unwed mothers in Ireland’s infamous mother-and-baby homes. Recent attention to the “grim conditions” of the homes, which were run by the Catholic Church, has enabled adoptees to search for their birth families, Queally reports. He writes, “For the ‘banished,’ there is the fear that their birth mothers will recoil at the idea of reconnecting with a child who represents a painful time in their lives. For the mothers, there is the fear their children will resent them for giving them up for adoption in the first place.”